Namibia - Swakopmund

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Hi all
it's me again from beautiful Swakopmund in Namibia.
After our sandstorm desaster we left early morning for the Seal Colony at Cape Cross. The colony usually consists of about 450,000 seals, but two bad fishing seasons have more than halfed that number. It was still an impressive sight, an incredible stench, and noise! A lot of seals were pregnant or had just had their babies, one of them actually gave birth in front of our eyes! I have to say, it was a bit of a disturbing sight that some of the babies were dead and were carried away by jackals, but this is nature is suppose. It seemed like every seal in the place had just produced a little one, and if all of them survived the world would have been taken over by seals long ago!
Towards lunchtime we headed for Swakopmund. The place looks amazing, like a small german town with palmtreas and the atlantic ocean. The signs are saying 'Haus Anton', 'Hotel Schweizerhof', Baeckerei, Apotheke, and the restaurants are offering 'Schweineschnitzel', 'Bratwurst und Sauerkraut'. The place is more german than Germany itself! During the afternoon i explored the little tidy town, went shopping for souvenirs, sat on the seafront (pretty chilly) and tried some Sauerkraut. From all the places I have seen in Africa, this HAS to be the least African one. For the first time, i could wander around town without people hassling me for money and trying to sell me stone hippos. I pretty much repeated exploring Swakopmund on the following day while the rest of our group went Sandboarding. After just having survived a Sandstorm, i was not tempted to go down the dunes on a snowboard. Apparently, the less talented ones of our group kept on eating dust, and i would have without a doubt belonged to that category!
On Saturday morning, our group went out to jump off a plane. We had booked a skydive over Swakopmund, but i have to say from the start i was not convinced. I got dressed, i got on the plane, i looked down, and i told my tandem partner to 'forget it'. It was the scariest thing I have ever seen in my life, people plunging out of planes at an altitude of tenthousand feet. Probably an irrational fear, as these skydivers had each done a couple of thousands flights, and so far their parachute has opened each time, but in case it doesn't... well... do i have to say more. I was a bit disappointed afterwards, but no way in the world could i have jumped out of this plane. At least I had a scenic flight over the ocean and the dunefield, and the skydivers were nice and only charged me the cost of the flight, not the jump.
That afternoon, we went out into the dunes to watch a sandboarding competition. No professionals, just plenty of enthusiasts who went down the sand half standing, half rolling. Still plenty of fun to watch.
I have to say, without participating in any of the adrenalin activities that are offered here in swakopmund, i really enjoyed the place for its beauty and its peacefulness. After travelling through Africa for thousands of miles, an afternoon spent on the seafront reading a book seemed far more attractive to me than jumping out of planes.
That's it from me, you will hear again from me from Capetown.
Love, K

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Comments

[robin]

a plate of bratwurst and sauerkraut in namibia has got to be one of the more unusual experiences life has to offer. been looking at photos of swakopmund and it is truly bizarre - they should shoot a movie there or something x see you soon ;)